'He saw it when translucent even Shed mystic light o'er earth and heaven, Dim shadowed on the deep; His fancy tinged each passing cloud With the fine phantom, and he bowed Before it in his sleep. 'He hears grey-bearded sailors tell How the discoveries befell That glorify their time; "And forth I go, my friends," he cries, "To a severer enterprise Than tasked your glorious prime. '"Time was when these green isles that stud The expanse of this familiar flood, Lived but in fancy fond. Earth's limits--think you here they are? Here has the Almighty fixed His bar, Forbidding glance beyond? '"Each shell is murmuring on the shore, And wild sea-voices evermore Are sounding in my ear: I long to meet the eastern gale, And with a free and stretching sail Through virgin seas to steer. '"Two galleys trim, some comrades stanch, And I with hopeful heart would launch Upon this shoreless sea. Till I have searched it through and through. And seen some far land looming blue, My heart will not play free." 'Forth fared he through the deep to rove: For months with angry winds he strove, And passions fiercer still; Until he found the long-sought land, And leaped upon the savage strand With an exulting thrill. 'The tide of life now eddies strong Through that broad wilderness, where long The eagle fearless flew; Where forests waved, fair cities rise, And science, art, and enterprise Their restless aim pursue. 'There dwells a people, at whose birth The shout of Freedom shook the earth, Whose frame through all the lands Has travelled, and before whose eyes, Bright with their glorious destinies, A proud career expands. 'I see their life by passion wrought To intense endeavour, and my thought Stoops backwards in its reach To him who, in that early time, Resolved his enterprise sublime On Porto Santo's beach. 'Methinks that solitary soul Held in its ark this radiant roll Of human hopes upfurled,-- That there in germ this vigorous life Was sheathed, which now in earnest strife Is working through the world. 'Still on our way, with careworn face, Abstracted eye, and sauntering pace, May pass one such as he, Whose mind heaves with a secret force, That shall be felt along the course Of far Futurity. 'Call him not fanatic or fool, Thou Stoic of the modern school; Columbus-like, his aim Points forward with a true presage, And nations of a later age May rise to bless his name.'